Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: Rasmus Paludan, the man who repeatedly committed desecration of the Holy Quran, is a Danish-Swedish politician and lawyer who leads the far-right Danish political party Stram Kurs (Hard Line), which he founded in 2017.
Having been dubbed as a “professional troublemaker” by Marine Le Pen – who herself is a far-right French parliamentarian, Paludan has recurrently made derogatory remarks about Muslims in videos posted online, while justifying his actions as an “expression of free speech.”
In a recent act of provocation, the anti-Muslim leader committed desecration of the Holy Quran by setting fire to a copy of the sacred Book in front of Turkey’s embassy in Sweden’s capital Stockholm on Saturday (January 21, 2023). The Swedish government had allowed Paludan to organise the demonstration in which he committed the highly disrespectful act that caused severe outrage among the Muslim community and received widespread condemnation from global Muslim leadership.
Consequently, Turkey cancelled the Swedish defence minister’s visit to the country on Saturday, as well as summoned Sweden’s envoy to Ankara. It also called on Stockholm to take the required legal action against the offenders. The leadership of a number of other Muslim nations including Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Morocco also strongly condemned the vile act.
However, it was not the first time that Paludan – who has also been charged with multiple other highly inappropriate offenses – had been involved in disrespecting or taunting Muslims or their religion, yet so far Swedish authorities have not undertaken any proper action to deter the far-right leader from his abominably disrespectful misconduct.
Provocative anti-Islam demonstrations
Primarily known for having carried out a large number of anti-Islam demonstrations in Denmark, often in localities housing Muslim minority groups, Paludan is also an alleged sexual predator and convicted racist. During these demonstrations, he marched into local Muslim neighbourhoods and made anti-immigrant and racist remarks while taunting local adherents of Islam (and the religion as a whole). Paludan has also multiple times committed the desecration the Holy Quran at his protests, which includes burning the Holy Book and treating it in other ways that Muslims find highly offensive. His provocative actions have led to counter-protests, some marked by violence.
In April 2019, Paludan held a demonstration in Viborg, Denmark, in the presence of about 100 counter-protesters leading to chaos. Three people were arrested following the incident. Later in June 2019, a Syrian man in his early twenties was sentenced to 60 days in jail for throwing a rock at Paludan. Following his sentence, the Syrian man was also deported from Denmark and banned from returning to the country for the next six years.
In June 2020, Paludan held a demonstration in Aarhus, Denmark, during which a 52-year-old man, provoked by the disrespectful conduct of the extremist politician, entered the cordoned-off area with a knife and ran towards Paludan. Security fired a warning shot, but the man did not lay down his weapon, as a result of which police opened fire and wounded him in the leg. The incident caused unrest in the area.
In April 2022, Paludan again organised and announced several anti-Islam demonstrations in major Swedish cities, where he burned the Holy Quran. This led to rioting by counter-protesters.
Allegations of sexual predation of minors
Ekstra Bladet – a Danish tabloid – in 2021 accused Paludan of sexual predation against young boys claiming that the far-right Swedish leader “talks about sex and makes up inappropriate stories with underage boys in his political online chat forum.”
The newspaper said that it had video and audio evidence from the chat server Discord, which proved that Paludan gathers young people, who in several cases state that they are under 13 years old.
“Rasmus Paludan often sits from late evening until late at night and talks to the young boys. The conversations are rarely about politics, sometimes about violence and often about sex,” the daily said in one of its articles published in 2021.
Being charged with racism, stalking and dangerous driving
Rasmus has so far been convicted of multiple offenses including racism, defamation and dangerous driving.
In 2020, a court in Sweden sentenced him to a month in jail for a string of offenses including the violation of the racism section of the Penal Code.
Previously, he was disbarred for three years as a criminal lawyer and was also been banned from driving for a year.
Paludan was also found guilty of defaming a woman of Somali origin at a demonstration by insinuating that she was a prostitute, Danish media reported.
The far-right Swedish politician has also been accused of pursuing and harassing a male fellow student at the University of Copenhagen with a number of inappropriate methods, including violent encroachment on the young man’s private life, according to Danish national daily Berlingske.
The newspaper Danmark reported, citing documents from the Ministry of Justice, that Paludan stalked and harassed a young man for several years to such an extent that politician received a restraining order of five years. It said that the documents revealed that both the victim and his family were close to collapse due to the years of harassment from Paludan.
